


Io Che Amo Solo Te

by HogwartsToAlexandria



Series: Marie Ships it All Shorts 2019 [12]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Coping, Fluff, M/M, Music, Night Terrors, Nightmares, Pre-Relationship, Tony Stark Has A Heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-27 20:30:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20052106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HogwartsToAlexandria/pseuds/HogwartsToAlexandria
Summary: Bucky's nightmares are frequent and, honestly, a pain to get through until the music starts playing and everything slows down and he can breathe again.Winteriron Week Day #1, prompt: "Secret Caretaking"Bad Things Happen Bingo 2019 Fill, B3: "Secret Caretaking"Winteriron Bingo 2019 Fill, G5: "Cheek Kiss"Bucky Barnes Bingo 2019 Fill, N3: "Free Space"





	Io Che Amo Solo Te

**Author's Note:**

> So, I organized this whole thing and am only now getting around to posting something for it! I'm going to try and write as much as I can before I post the Masterlist on Friday as I said I would. Hoping you'll like this!
> 
> It was betad by the adorable Irismustang, thank you dear!!

Pitch-black. Darkness. Obsidian void. Ebony nothingness. 

Bucky tries to find his breath. Tries to rein in the inarticulate fear that's taken over his body and paralyzed him as he slept. He tries to move and finds he can't, tries to sit up, to pull on the sheets or his hair or the tank top that's sticking to his chest and back in cold sweat. He can't. Nothing does it and he waits. Even as trepidation makes the blood in his veins boil and his whole body shake, there's something at the back of his mind, faint and frail, that tells him he'll be okay, if can just wait a minute, just a minute longer. 

And that's when it starts off again. He doesn't recognize it right away, lost as he is, but a few notes of piano and a gentle voice that sings in what he half-consciously recognizes as Italian come through the speakers at the four corners of his room and he can feel the effect of it all already. 

It's like the music can seep through his pores, gentling the cadence of his heartbeat, soothing the ache of his every joint. Note after note, word after word, reality comes back to his nightmare-addled brain and lifts Bucky back up. 

He takes the first deep breath of this early morning terror after about ten minutes of the same calming music playing in the background. His lungs hurt with the way they've struggled to fill themselves for much longer than any regular person could handle and even he, serumed as he is, can hardly take that without flinching. 

It's alright now though, he's alright. The low voices that ask for mission reports and that repeat words of his former programming are finally silenced. He probably won't fall back asleep tonight but at least he can breathe, and move now. 

The clock tells him it's 4 a.m. which, Bucky thinks, is not that bad. Could have been worse at least. 

The music is still playing by the time he makes his way to the bathroom to take a much needed shower and Bucky is thankful for it.   
  


It's hours later when he comes down to the common floor to meet the others for breakfast. It's the same every day, Nat and Bruce will have already eaten but Steve and Sam will want to have breakfast after their jog and come up around 8, Thor will barge in whenever he gets up and Tony will most likely make a mumbled beeline for the coffee machine and eventually stick around to chat or go back to his workshop, depending. 

Bucky has joined the communal breakfast at all hours of this makeshift schedule before and he's glad he chose not to go down too soon today. Just having to explain why he would might be enough to send him spiralling back down the hyperventilating lane, no thanks. 

He's sitting at the island nursing a bowl of cereal and a mug of coffee when Steve and Sam do come up. 

It takes Bucky all of two seconds to recognize the bags under Steve's eyes and a side look at Sam confirms his suspicions. He doesn't say anything until after Steve has sat down next to him, looking defeated as can be and that just always gets him.

They munch over their respective bowls in relative silence until Bucky has to ask, "Nightmare?" 

The room is almost eerily quiet as he waits for his lifelong friend to answer, or even react, but then Steve nods and he looks so utterly dejected about it. Bucky frowns still.

"Does the music not help you?" He asks, a finger tapping against his mouth as he thinks back on his own night, and all the other nights before that.

"What music?" Sam pipes in when Steve only looks at Bucky with confusion written all over his features. 

"Yeah Buck, what music? There's no music just...the ice?" Steve struggles to even say the word today, Bucky notes, that's never good. Bucky makes a confused noise of his own at that.

"The music that Friday plays every time I have nightmares? The music she played last night when I woke up?" He says and doesn't understand the way both men exchange glances at that. "What? I thought that was standard procedure or something, it's not?"

Sam is smirking when he sits back in his chair and Steve smiles at him in that way he's developed ever since Bucky was freed from the program, ever since he'd started showing in an interest in the here and now, in the 21st century and all that is so new about it - indulgence.

"No it's not Buck, there's no music when I wake up. Unless I ask for it that is." 

Steve doesn't look cross about it so that's good, Bucky figures, but there's also that slightly mocking light in his eye that tells him he's figured something out that Bucky doesn't see yet and that's a bit unnerving. 

"But--" he starts but cuts himself when Tony walks into the room, clad in his workout gear - the one that makes it all but sinful to look at him frankly - and Bucky watches him as he expectedly goes straight for the coffee machine. 

He's singing under his breath, something slow and gentle and Bucky listens even as he watches, the other two men in the room silent after they said their perfunctory hellos. 

Bucky doesn't think he's obvious, doesn't think he can be obvious after all the training he's been through in his life to make sure his face would be unreadable and yet, he can practically feel Steve snickering beside him. Punk. 

Only, he doesn't spare him a glance; his eyes go gradually larger as he looks at Tony and listens to what he's singing, telling himself he's just doing it out of habit and not because Tony has a nice voice, soothing, low. 

Sleep is long gone by now, hours after his eyes fell open in terror, but Bucky almost curses when the words Tony is singing finally register. His mouth drops open just as Tony turns around with a steaming mug of coffee cradled between his hands. 

"Lookin' to catch flies, Barnes?" Tony raises an eyebrow at him. 

Bucky doesn't close his mouth back, can't. 

"Was that...the lyrics, was that Italian?" He asks instead. 

That's all he needs to know he's correct, to know what Steve realized right when he mentioned the music. Tony's face never seems to manage to retain the thoughts that govern his mind as they pass through it and it shows, right there, that he knows he's revealed himself. 

Bucky takes a deep breath. Tony doesn't answer, just shrugs. He looks like he wants to fly right back out of the room, hiding half his face behind his coffee but he doesn't move. Sam and Steve are still silent and unmoving and Bucky is glad they are, he can't deal with that right now. 

"I…" he pinches the bridge of his nose, cursing his inability to express himself. He knows Tony will say something stupid and deflective to save face if he can't get the words soon enough. Bucky doesn't want that, he thinks, he doesn't want that at all. "Thank you. Thank you, Tony," he says in the end and as recognition passes through the other man's features, Bucky gives him a little smile. Those were the right words, he didn't screw it up. 

He doesn't know what it means. He doesn't know where to go from there either, but Tony nods, takes a sip of his coffee and instead of going right back to the workshop, he sits down on a stool not too far from Bucky's. That's one of those days then. Bucky made it so. 

He smiles only to cough right through it when Steve picks this moment to get up and show in no uncertain terms that he's leaving the room now and not because he's got better things to do, no, but because he wants them to have this, together, alone. 

Sam followed suit and it's a bit awkward but Bucky smiles again and his heart skips a beat when Tony does the same. 

He doesn't know what it means, but he can guess. Same as he doesn't know exactly where to go from there, but Tony seems just as unsure as he is so Bucky thinks they'll figure it out together. 

It's an impulse he doesn't want to question and, by the look in Tony's eyes when he straightens back up, Bucky's glad he didn't; he takes one long look at Tony before getting up and pressing his lips to the man's cheek. It's gentle and makes his fingers and heart tingle with the same butterflies. It feels good to be able to do that, to be sure Tony wants it too, to be certain they'll make it work somehow. 

**Author's Note:**

> As I said, will try to come up with little things for the other days before the close! Tell me what you thought of this? I'm still new to writing this pairing so it's always a little thrill to post :)
> 
> You can also find me on [Tumblr](https://hogwartstoalexandria.tumblr.com/)! 😘


End file.
